In the early hours of October 7, 2023, the unthinkable happened. Families were murdered in their beds. Young people dancing for peace were massacred. The elderly were kidnapped from their homes. The Hamas attack on Israel shattered any illusion of security and unleashed a wave of antisemitism across the globe not seen since the darkest days of the 20th century.
Yet even as shadows lengthen around us, we are strengthened by three thousand years of Jewish perseverance. Rabbi Jonathan Sacks taught during another period of terror in 2015, that our capacity to find hope in darkness is our inheritance from our patriarch Jacob. His insight resonates even more deeply today, as we face unprecedented challenges to Jewish life and safety worldwide.
Jacob repeatedly found God in his darkest moments. When fleeing his brother’s murderous rage, alone in the wilderness of Beth El, he discovered divine presence through his dream of angels ascending and descending a heavenly ladder. As the Torah tells us:
Years later, on the eve of a dreaded reunion with Esau, Jacob wrestled through the night with a mysterious being at the ford of Jabbok, emerging transformed with a new name – Israel. The text records this transformation:
Even in his elder years, facing famine in Canaan, God appeared to him in a night vision on his was down to Egypt, saying:
In the words of Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, “Jacob never lived in peace, but somehow, he took all the fear and pain and loneliness and isolation and turned them into a vision of heaven and found God in the very midst of that place and moment of danger.” Even as he faced Esau and a Laban, and despite the loss of his dear son Joseph, he kept moving forward and never gave up. In each moment of deep personal crisis, Jacob encountered the divine precisely when he felt most vulnerable and alone. It was Jacob who endowed his descendants with this same inner strength to keep moving forward and never give up.
Today’s challenges echo through Jewish history – from Egyptian slavery to the Spanish Inquisition, from Crusader massacres to the Holocaust. Yet in each dark chapter, our ancestors discovered an extraordinary capacity to maintain hope and human dignity. They embodied the words of Psalms:
The current crisis has exposed a troubling reality: antisemitism was never truly vanquished, only dormant. Jewish students face harassment on college campuses. Synagogues require armed guards. Wearing visible symbols of Jewish identity invites risk in many cities. The prophet Jeremiah’s lament resonates anew: “Terror is on every side” (Jeremiah 20:10).
But like Jacob wrestling with the angel, we must engage with this darkness rather than surrender to it. This means standing proudly as Jews while refusing to let hatred poison our own hearts. It means building bridges with allies who recognize that antisemitism threatens not just Jews, but the very foundations of civil society. It means remembering that even in our darkest hours, we remain the people who brought the light of ethical monotheism to humanity.
The Book of Ecclesiastes teaches that “To everything there is a season” (3:1). This is our season of testing, but also of opportunity – to demonstrate that Jewish values of justice, compassion and human dignity can triumph over barbarism and hatred. We draw strength from knowing that we have faced far worse and emerged not just surviving, but teaching the world how to transform suffering into moral progress.
As we pray for the safe return of hostages and peace for all who dwell in the Holy Land, we remember that we are the descendants of Jacob – the one who wrestled with both divine and human challenges and prevailed.
This moment calls us to be worthy of our ancestors’ legacy – to face darkness with dignity, to answer hatred with hope, and to trust that dawn will follow even the longest night. As the prophet Isaiah promised:
May we soon see that light.
